Kickin' it with home improvement

I saw a new Home Depot commercial on TV last night that implored viewers to "kick your excuses to the curb" and finally finish those home projects they've been meaning to get to (I'm paraphrasing; it was late).

That got me thinking about my excuses for not getting to the projects I have either in-progress or on THE LIST. What I came up with is: time, not having the right tools, inconvenience (tools and supplies live in my basement storage unit and I do all my cutting down there) and a lack of knowledge of exactly what I'm doing.

Of course, time is the biggest of these. I can deal with all the others, but without the time to commit to projects, nothing else matters. As I thought about time, that seemed too generic, so I've broke it down into segments: work, family (in general and watching my daughter during the day) and basic household chores.

So if I were to kick my excuses to the curb, I'd be unemployed and wolves would be raising my daughter. I think I'll just deal with my tortoise-like DIY pace.

A "tired" old scam

Everything I know about car maintenance and repair I learned from my first car, an '83 VW Rabbit. It was a solid piece of automobile, complete with metal bumpers, that I overpaid for and constantly had to tweak just to keep it running. There was no fuel injection on that beast, so it's fair to say that aside from the basics, I know nothing about today's engines. And I know less about suspensions.

Not surprisingly, my wife knows very little. More surprisingly is that there are repair shops that didn't learn from all the hidden camera investigations that revealed mechanics attempting to persuade female customers they needed expensive (and completely unnecessary) repairs.

Am I making inaccurate, wild or irresponsible accusations? Judge for yourself after reading the facts.

A short time ago, my wife took one of our cars to a Northeast-based national chain that specializes in tires to get four new ones installed. (Rather than refer to them by name, I'll simply refer to them as Tire Giant to keep the lawyers away.) Through social media, Tire Giant provided us with a discount on the service, so it seemed like a great deal.

Once the car was in Tire Giant's possession, an employee told my wife that the tie rods and boots (among other things) were shot. Unless we spent more than $1,000 to repair them, Tire Giant wouldn't be able to perform an alignment. Nor could they guarantee their work. Being naturally suspicious of repair shops, and wanting to have the problem checked out by our regular garage (friends of the family), she declined the repairs. As you might imagine, the car drove very poorly without that alignment. Especially at high speeds, which, when someone commutes by highway an hour each way to and from work, is not only annoying, but downright dangerous.

Fast forward to our regular shop, where we took the car for an inspection. After performing a thorough examination of the vehicle as they usually do when we bring it in for any service, they not only issued an inspection sticker, but didn't see anything wrong with the items Tire Giant had mentioned. Unfortunately, this garage doesn't do alignments, so we had to find a new shop.

Yesterday, Don Foshay's Discount Tire in Biddeford performed the much-needed alignment - for $39.95. They had no trouble doing this with the supposedly "shot" tie rod et al, nor did they mention that those items needed to be replaced. How odd.

You may disagree, but from where I'm sitting, if one shop wants to perform $1,000+ worth of repairs, shouldn't another? I'd think so. But neither of the two other shops where we took our car did. And one of them was able to perform that "impossible" alignment without those repairs.

No wonder repair shops and mechanics get a bad name. All of this makes me wish I knew more about cars and could perform more work myself. Apparently, it's possible to do your own alignment, but while I love learning new skills, in matters of safety I'll leave that to the professionals.

Unless those professionals work for Tire Giant.

Extreme drywall repairs

As I mentioned in my last post, I like to keep any drywall repairs simple. My skills do go beyond a simple DAP Patch Stick, but I'd rather not use them for a lot of reasons. The mess of sanding being at the top of the list.

But there will come a time when I'll need to man up and go the distance, even if that means cutting old drywall out and replacing it with a new patch.

That's why I love Extreme How-To. It's one of the best DIY resources out there, and they are great at taking what could be a very difficult project and providing thorough step-by-step directions, like they've done with this article on repairing drywall.

After reading it, you'll understand why the magazine is called EXTREME How-To.

Toothpaste for grownups

Ever have to patch drywall? I have, and you know what? For the most part, it's not that hard to do.

The easiest I've ever used is to fill nail (or dart) holes with white toothpaste (ah, college). On a white wall, it can be almost impossible to notice. Do it the night before your landlord comes by for the final walk-through and you should get your security deposit back. Or at least if you don't, the nail holes won't be why.

As an adult male homeowner, toothpaste won't do. So for small-ish holes (i.e. 99 percent of what I've dealt with), I use a marvelous invention called the DAP Patch Stick. It's like the toothpaste trick, just more permanent and durable. And it's for grownups. At less than four bucks a stick, there's no excuse for not having one stowed in the garage or junk drawer. That goes for every household.

(As an aside, the last time I was at Home Depot, I noticed there's now a DAP Stick specifically for nail holes, which costs about a dollar more. Is it worth the difference? I'll let you judge for yourself. Personally, I'm reminded of the Simpsons episode where a company released a "new" version of the Malibu Stacy doll with the only change being that she had a different hat.)

The other grownup method I've used for repairing drywall is much more labor-intensive. Therefore I avoid it as much as possible. If the hole's too big for the DAP Stick (in my estimation, which tends to be much more liberal than DAP's), I have to get out the old drywall mud, slather some on, smooth it as much as possible, wait for it to dry and then sand it smooth. Luckily, I've only had to do this a few times - with varying results.

And most luckily of all, I've never had a hole big enough to require floating a new piece of drywall (knock on wood). That would require a house call/demo from dear old Dad.

%&*@! garden

Here in Maine, it was in the high 60s and low 70s this weekend, which meant having a picnic near the ocean (Fort Williams in Cape Elizabeth), lots of playing outside with our daughter, and the first Dairy Queen run of the year. With Sunday being Easter, we spent a great day (mostly outdoors) with extended family.

What this weekend didn't mean was tackling any DIY - with the exception of pulling some weeds in the garden. For a lot of people, gardening is zen-like in its relaxing qualities. Not so for me.

Even though we live in an old shoe factory (which houses 30-plus other units) and all the land is community property, we do have a garden plot, which is essentially a 10' by 20' box constructed from 2x4s that's filled with topsoil. For the last four summers, we've faithfully grown tomatoes, cucumbers, herbs and even pumpkins - with varying success.

As a garden, ours would make a great lawn. While there are a lot of weeds, the
biggest problem is grass, which grows in our plot like, well, weeds. To give you some idea just how bad it is, the photo to the left isn't from the other day. No, that was our "garden" last August. I'm not proud.

After four years, we want to fix that before we plant this year. Which means I have my work cut out for me.

The next non-rainy Saturday (and/or Sunday), I'll be out there with a shovel, digging out all the topsoil so we can lay a plastic lining. Then I'll be re-filling our box with new soil.

I'm not looking forward to the back-breaking drudgery. But compared to plucking hundreds of blades of grass on a weekly basis, the trade-off is more than worth it.